Plastics recovery and recycling from clinical wastes has been a thorny matter, with Environment Agency pedants saying No without a thought to the material, environmental and economic value of resource recovery.

Instead, they prefer incineration especially for sharps waste that now included much high grade plastic as syringes and needles are discarded intact. Without evidence, plastics and other resource recovery has been blighted and the industry forced to continue incineration of these wastes for….well, perhaps only for the sake of a deal done on the golf course!

In the US, the larger scale supports greater economies and technical advances are both researched and realised through a translational approach taking experimental studied from the laboratory to the workplace. Regulators support well-founded and appropriately managed development.

It is reported that a facility that processes 100 tons of medical waste per year has developed a new recycling program for syringes, needles and containers for their reuse in the healthcare industry.

Vernon-based Waste Management’s (WM) program seeks to reuse some of the material recycled from about 8 million syringes and needles discarded annually in the United States, while at the same time raising awareness among the millions of people who inject themselves at home about the proper handling of these hazardous waste items.

http://egpnews.com/2013/01/vernon-based-company-develops-recycling-program-for-medical-waste/

The scheme is backed by the US giant BD working in association with a major waste management company.

Congratulations to them.